My brain does not want to be reading non-fiction right now.
​
After a slew of romantasy and hockey romances, I was going to pivot to another romance series. I requested what I thought was the next book from my library, but after reading one sentence, it felt familiar. I dove into my reading list and confirmed that I had, indeed, read that book - and the next one - already. Bummer.

I have more books on my hold list, but they're not ready yet. In the meantime, I picked up the non-fiction read I use to fill gaps like this. My brain has other plans.

Instead of the 40-50 pages I've been managing lately, I'm falling asleep after two. Last night I think I managed two paragraphs. My brain is clearly not in the mood for anything educational at night.

Recently, I read a Culture Study newsletter where an interviewee was asked, "If you could follow only one Instagram account forever, what would it be?"

I found that idea intriguing, so I went through my feed to determine who I would pick. At the start of this process, I followed 84 accounts. Narrowing down the list was not that hard.

The first thing I did was discard the people I know in real life. (This is the bulk of my follows.) I adore their posts, but I can also get the same updates (probably more) in the group chat.

Next, I discarded any accounts I follow strictly for local updates. Again, I have different ways of getting this information. I also tossed out the libraries I follow. Love what they showcase, but those accounts are  too "work" focused for me.

Then, I looked at what was left and tossed out anything I follow "just for fun." These are the accounts that bring me joy but do not add a richness to my life. It was a surprising amount of web comics and comedy.

This left about about four accounts for me to seriously consider. In the end, my pick came down to the fact that this account posts a mix of content, brings me joy, provides some intellectual stimulation, is aesthetically pleasing, and shares something I can't get in other ways.

In the end, Ainsley du Rose came out on top. She lives in Paris (my favorite city) and chronicles her work as a home pastry chef. She provides walking tours of the city (and travel content whenever she leaves town). Ainsley also showcases small businesses, some fashion and design, her dog, and local events. It's the mix of the food, travel, style, and cute dog that won me over.

Another upside of this thought exercise was that I ended up clearing out my follows. 

Welcome to Maycember for those who celebrate.

May. The month of many things.

May. Where the end of the public school year meets summer planning.

May. Where it's college graduation season, and all of the end of the academic year tasks and events that come with it.

May. Where you need to dig out of all the winter/spring needle task items you haven't done yet.

May. Where all you want to do is be outside but, instead, are stuck inside getting things done.

May.

The month that promises a break but immediately lies about it.

I hosted a blackout poetry workshop for my library this week. It was not as well attended as I hoped it would be. (Thank you to the professor who brought her class by in the last hour!)

While I waited for people to drop by, I made a few blackout poems for myself. It was a meditative experience. It forces you to focus on the words - just the words - before you find a greater meaning in the text. Then, you have to carefully black out what you don't want. More than once, I had to change course when my sharpie went a bit too far in the text.

One of the poems turned out so well I decided to paste it into my bullet journal. Not only did the text speak to me, but I was able to decorate the page with the perfect image clipped from a magazine. 

Despite the low attendance, I plan to bring the workshop back. It's a great way to engage with a literary form that can be intimidating. 

Another short intro this week. Yesterday was a travel day, and today is a reentry day.

Coming back from a week away for home always feels like a rude awakening. Since the husband was here all week, my to-do list is not that long, but there are still things I need to prep.

​Also, I already miss watching the kiddo trying to catch lizards. 

Keeping this intro short. Kiddo and I flew to Florida for her spring break yesterday. Whilst she galivants with the grandparents, I'll be "working from home." This is our third year of doing it, and it's working out great! I don't know how long we'll be able to maintain this schedule, but I love the balance it provides our family. Kiddo gets grandparent time. I get focused work time. The husband gets his solo week to do whatever the hell he wants.

Our neighborhood is in full bloom. Some of the plants I know. Most of them, I don't. This week, while on the way to school, the kiddo stopped to ask about a random flower growing in someone's yard. Instead of guessing, I pulled out iNaturalist. I recently downloaded it and we figured we'd find out together. 

After I dropped her off, I logged a few more blooms on my way back home. I also uploaded a picture of a coyote (!!) we saw on our walk to school earlier in the week. That sighting was eventually "confirmed" by another user of the app. When I got the email notification, I ended up exploring some of the community features of the program.

What I hope is that, this first week of use, becomes the start of something bigger.

I’d love for our walks - whether it’s to school or along our local trails - to turn into little explorations. Not in a big, over-planned way, just in a “let’s see what we notice today” kind of way. Maybe we start keeping track of the things we find. Maybe we try to identify a few new plants each week. Maybe we just get a little more curious together.

I like the idea of having something that gently nudges us to pay attention. To stop when we see something interesting. And, maybe, to follow those small questions to learning more together at the library.

And, I'm hoping this gets us (really, me) outside more.

This app feels like a way to connect with nature, our neighborhood, and each other. And if it helps us slow down and wonder at a few more flowers along the way, that's all the better.

The husband likes to, jokingly, give me grief about the typos and grammatical errors in what I post. I do review things before I hit post but, when you've been staring at the same text all week, you miss things. 

Hey, at least you know it's not written by AI! To err is human.

I have thought about popping my text into Claude and treating it like a copy editor, but I simply can't be bothered.

Now, when I made a you're/your error in an exhibit sign I had to hand draw for work... that I fixed. You have to have some standards after all.

I was at a conference for most of this week. Computers in Libraries has always been one of my favorites. Because it's in DC, it draws a diverse crowd of librarians that makes for some really interesting presentations.

The diverse crowd was still there - but almost every session was about AI in some way.

*sigh* I'm tired.

I get that AI is important, and I genuinely do want to learn about it. But I need a break. The sheer volume of AI-focused presentations meant there was a lot of overlap, and I found myself hearing the same five talking points repeated ad nauseam. By the last day, I started picking sessions based on how little AI was mentioned in the description. Sadly, even those sessions managed to work it in somehow.

Oh well. There's always next year.

We had a cleaning team come over this week. It's an expense I find valuable because I loathe scrubbing the shower. But I laugh because we always clean for the cleaners. It seems silly, but if we want the cleaners to be able to do their best work, we need to straighten up our space before they arrive.

At first, I was frustrated that I had to go through every room in our home and neaten things up. After a few sessions, I realized this was a great way to stay on top of things. Now, I look forward to tackling piles I've been ignoring or tossing things that have been sitting out. The cleaners arrival is a hard deadline that forces us to just do stuff already.

It also gives me a chance to reconsider where we keep things. For example, we line the bottom of our countertop compost bin with gently used paper towels. (It makes it easier to dump out the contents.) Previously, we kept these paper towels folded underneath the compost bin itself. During one cleaner visit, they thought the paper towels were meant to go out with the compost and tossed everything. For future cleaning visits, I moved our paper towel pile into a cabinet. Turns out, that was a better place for it! Now they live there permanently.

Also, I'm slower to put to stuff back out after the cleaners are done. This has helped me realize we need less "stuff" visible on a normal day. It's a way to calm the space and allows us to reconsider what we need readily available.